The Life of Erik Lensherr
by Melinda H
Summary: My ideas of what happened to Magneto after the death of his mother, before he meets Charles. Possible First Class spoilers. T for some language and violence. Please read!
1. Preface

**Disclaimer: You know the deal - I own nothing, I'm just drawing from my imagination, yadda yadda yadda.** **To be clear, I have not read any of the comics; I am just a fan of the movies, and of Magneto in particular. So, for any inconsistencies, I am sorry.**

**Either way, I hope you enjoy this story, in which I will hopefully explore the uncharted past of Erik Lensherr during his time at the camps and beyond. Thanks.**

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><p><strong>Preface<strong>

Beneath its fleshy surface, my body ticks and clicks as cogs whirl round and round in their customary revolutions, as they had the day before and as they will the day after next. Hard, cold, strong, and smooth, I am a machine with glassy eyes that burn red hate into every object on which I set them. My face is stone; expressionless, mirthless, merciless, devoid of all emotion except the occasional burst of rage. I look down out my forearm where the serial number is located. _We're sorry, but this model has been discontinued. We can no longer accept returns or refunds. If you have further questions feel free to contact the manager._

I smile grimly and flex my fingers, watching the muscles contract and release as they grip an invisible throat. I know whose throat belongs in them - that above all else I am sure of - but timing and availability is a problem that I cannot avoid. That throat always evades me, but one day I will find it and crush it between my palms.

Shaw is his name. Shaw is the one responsible for destroying my life, the life of my mother, and countless others. Shaw is going to die a slow, painful death one of these days; I will make sure of it.

But Shaw also created me. As much as it disgusts me, I am this machine, this cold-blooded magnet because of him. My skills are honed and sharp like a spear tipped with anger and pain because of his teaching and his torture. I had the humanity and the empathy kicked out of me as a teenager by him, but in return I had gained an assassin's peace of mind and clarity of thought, if that counted for anything. It doesn't matter now what he did back then and why he did it. He is going to die. I am going to kill him.

Revenge is my mission, my reason for living, the grease in my wheels and the air in my lungs. Maybe, just maybe, when he is dead I can rest easy. Maybe things will then go back to the way they were before the camps; simple and peaceful and uncomplicated.

I laughed out loud. No, things are never going to be the way they were, if they ever truly were that way. I am different, I am _better_ than I was then. I am remarkable. I deserve more than a two-room house in Poland, never knowing who would invade and declare themselves sovereign. Being what I am, I'm above governments and laws. I am a machine, cold, hard, strong, and smooth. I am superior. I am alone.

I was not always such, though. Once upon a time I was as soft as putty, uncertain and afraid. Once upon a time I felt emotions besides anger; pain, hope, love, regret, and fear. Once upon a time I was a plaything, a serial number with no name and no future.

I am 407128. This is my story.


	2. Wake

**Day One: Wake**

I crawled into my bunk, physically and emotionally exhausted after the day's events. There were no sheets on the stained grey mattress, nothing to muffle the scratch of uncomfortable wool on skin exposed to it. I was given a blanket, initially, and I placed that on top of me, trying to touch it as little as possible and gather warmth simultaneously, both unsuccessfully.

"Why are they shaving our heads?" I wondered earlier that day, before Mama and I were separated, surprised to find out that I had spoken out loud.

Before she could answer, a man in line in front of us swung around and grinned down at me toothlessly. I recoiled at the sight of his pasty skin and mossy jagged mouth. "To keep the bugs out, of course!" he said robustly, promptly dissolving into hacking coughs.

I looked at Mama uncertainly, edging back from the man. She shook her head and muttered something comforting, but I was not soothed.

When he recovered, he continued, "Well, they have their own purposes, too, you know. Nazis are like those American Indians – they use _every part of the beast_!" He pointedly looked down at the blanket in my arms and shook with wheezing, gasping laughs.

_Oogfhh_, said my mother in disgust as she steered me away from hysterically cackling man, shooting him an evil glare. But the damage had been done. I looked down at the blanket I was holding and noticed the tiny, multicolored, curling hairs woven together to create something with which I was supposed to sleep with.

Horrified, I dropped the blanket.

"No, Erik!" my mother said, snatching it back out of the mud. "You will not get another! In these places, warmth is life and death. _Life and death!_ Do you hear me?" She looked into my eyes frantically, and when I said nothing, she shook me.

I blinked to clear the fuzz out of my mind. "I… I hear you." Dazedly, I took the blanket back and thought nothing more of it.

That was only minutes before the Fence Incident, as it was known as later on. Six men used to restrain a mere twelve-year-old boy… Let's just say the word got around fast. People were afraid and skeptical, and once they heard I got a private session with Shaw, who was quickly gaining a reputation to rival Mengele's, no one wanted to look, let alone talk, to me. In a camp full of 'undesirables,' I was the plague.

I lay like a log there in my bunk, ignoring whispers and pin-prick stares. I lay there, thinking that maybe if I tried hard enough, I would dissolve, evaporate, turn to stone, or die, just as I had bent that fence or destroyed that room. I thought that if I minimized my movements and my breathing, that I would eventually cease to exist and melt into the landscape.

This wasn't happening. It couldn't be. It was a dream, an awfully vivid dream. Please God, I prayed, please just make this be a dream! I squeezed my eyes shut and bit my lip, overwhelmed. In the morning I would wake up at home… I would wake up and Mama would be there making kanapka or oatmeal or scrambled eggs. She would say good morning and kiss me on the head, and then I would protest, because I'm not a baby anymore, and then I would get out of bed and sweep the floor while she cleaned up breakfast, then she would go open up the dress shop for Mr. Bogzek and I would help her take inventory and roll the lint off the fabric, and then go to school for the rest of the morning and afternoon, and then come home and help her close up the shop and make dinner, and then she would kiss me goodnight, and I would protest because I'm not a baby, no I'm not a baby, I'm not a goddamn baby anymore, but I'm a twelve year old boy who needs his mom, I need my mom, goddamn it, I need my mom, I'm not a baby, I just need my mom, please, I just need my god damn mom, god damn, God Damn, GOD DAMN, _GOD DAMN!_

And just like that, I wound up not a log, not a stone, not a machine, but a scared little boy surrounded by walking skeletons sobbing for life in a bunk that reeked of death.


	3. Bear

**Day Two: Bear**

Ice. I was wrapped in a blanket of ice. I shivered and gathered myself closer, wildly hallucinating in my half-conscious state. I was lumbering up a great hill of snow, the wind whipping at me from all directions. I closed my watering eyes to a crack in a vain attempt to shield them, as the icy breath permeated my skin, jarring my bones and dislodging my hair follicles, so that as I mounted the crest, my white fur was falling away in large tufts, which were soon swept away by the destructive wind.

I looked down my black snout from the mountaintop to the land below, hoping and praying for a body of water, a forest, anything that would change the scenery. There was none. I was a solitary polar bear in an arctic land where the snow and ice went on for eternity, with no protection or shelter or hope. Surely I would not last long.

A shuffling sound woke me from my despairing dreams and I stirred, opening my eyes for them to be suddenly filled with piercing light. I winced and squinted as my eyes adjusted. There were whitewashed walls and tile floors with a single drain located off to one side. All was a blindingly pure white, like sun reflecting off snow, painfully reminding me of my dream.

I was strapped to a metal operating table in the center of the room, stark naked and chilled to the bone. Surrounding me were wheeling trays of surgical tools, menacingly orderly and shiny in the light. Despite the lack of heat, I broke out into a sweat.

I heard another shuffle like the one that woke me, followed by an exclamation. "Oh good! You're awake," came a horribly familiar voice from behind me. Like a singular muscle, my whole body tensed, and I growled, despite myself.

Shaw stepped into my line of view, grinning that curling, arrogant, annoying grin. He was dressed in scrubs, wearing the little mouth covering and all. In one plastic-gloved hand he held a syringe filled with clear liquid. "I would have brought you in here conscious… But some of my men argued that it was safer this way. You know, after what happened yesterday," he said amusedly, as if I were a pesky pet that was always getting into naughty trouble.

"Screw you!" was all my twelve-year-old brain could come up with, making Shaw laugh long and hard. I glared at him, silently willing him to burst into flames.

I glanced sidelong at the glistening tools just a few feet to my right. They seemed to be there to taunt me. It was all too perfect. I looked back to Shaw, who was smiling as if he had just read my mind. "That's my boy," he said softly. "You're on your way, aren't you? Marvelous! Simply marvelous!" he exclaimed cheerfully.

"One day you will be doing great things, great things indeed. What you have is a muscle, you know, and soon we will have you nice and lean and strong, fit to move mountains! Just you see. But we've got to start somewhere, haven't we? And what a better place than here."

I most definitely did not like the way this was turning out. Naked and strapped to a table, surrounded by possible weapons for murder and dismemberment, no, I did not like this at all. The table on which I was attached to began to rumble and shake, as did the tables with the utensils on them. Curiously, the tools themselves did not move. They were perfectly still.

Shaw took a deep breath through his nose. "Smell that?" he said. "It's fear. Confusion. Hate." He exhaled satisfyingly, reveling in the moment.

I looked up at him, my face that of utmost hate, staring at the madman with my jaw clenched.

However, this only appeared to encourage Shaw. "You see, right now you are wild. You are filled with extreme emotions, are you not? After all, you just lost your mother –"

"Because you killed her!" I interjected at the top of my lungs, unable to take it.

"– and you're understandably upset about that," he said as if I hadn't spoken at all. "But, the thing is, we don't _need_ all that baggage. Love and grief are such _heavy_ emotions, and right now they're weighing you down. As we established yesterday, anger and pain are your real motivators. So, let's build on that."

I did _not_ like the way this was going. My eyes grew wide as I looked at him, my jaw slack.

"You're like a wild animal. What we need to do is get you house broken, catch my drift? We have to get you fit to saddle. You need to capture that power of yours and learn to use it well, with deadly precision, and we can't do that when you're full of all those hormones."

Reaching out for a scalpel, he set down the syringe and leaned in uncomfortably close to me. "So let's consider this lesson one," he breathed softly.

Panic mode officially on, my adrenaline kicked in and my entire body positively shook with fear and nervousness and anger. The tables rattled dangerously, as did the drain covering, but the scalpel in his hand remained still.

Shaw looked at me smiling, clicking his tongue and waving his finger disapprovingly. "407128, do you know what is best about the Nazis and their Third Reich?" He paused a moment for dramatic effect. I certainly would not answer. "They have state-of-the-art technology. What you're looking at here," he said waving the scalpel, "is a fascinating little invention called 'plastic'. This is a prototype designed just for you; sharp as a knife and without all that metal – I think you'll come to appreciate it. I know I will."

A nasty smile, a bright light, and endless pain became my constant companions in the longest forty-eight hour period of my life. I was manufactured there in that room, hot off the assembly line, model year 1944. I went in as a pile of raw materials taken straight out of the earth, Erik Lensherr, and emerged two days later, a crude but promising handcrafted work of art, a machine, 407128.


	4. Wild

**Warning: Contains graphic violence.**

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><p><strong>Wild<strong>

I would be a liar if I said that when I walked out of that room I was a completely different person. No, I was still Erik Lensherr, a twelve-year-old Polish Jew. But, at the same time, I _wasn't_ the same person. The events of the last three days scarred me completely, sending me down a path that Shaw had laid out, one that I had never chosen. But the damage was done. I was transformed.

I will not censor myself for you. I lived through these moments, and every day they replay in my mind, an endless loop of painful memories. So, you may read this, but you will never _ever _understand what it was like to be there in that room, dying just a little bit more inside with every second.

Shaw held the scalpel to my chest, just below the collarbone, and pressed down till it broke skin. I felt the cold smooth plastic slide inside me, driving my skin apart with a merciless persistence, painful and remarkably unpleasant feeling. I groaned and struggled against my bonds, but was helpless.

"This is pain. Physical pain. You feel it, yes?" I stared at him. What a stupid question. "That aching in your heart," he tapped my left breast for emphasis, "is also pain. One can feel both simultaneously, but most often, they have nothing to do with each other.

"This being our first lesson, we must start from the very bottom and work our way up. One day, I hope you will no longer need this, but now, as unbroken as you are, I'm sure you will. To be very honest, this will not be pleasant. It is the only way, though…"

Unbidden tears rolled down my cheeks, pooling in my ears, my fear was so great. The weight of the unknown was drowning me; I wished he would just finish. I wished this all would just end.

"This is only the beginning, Erik," he said softly, as if reading my mind. "But before we can really start, you must know what is at stake."

The knife joined my skin once more, biting into me in an infinite moment of total pain. I cannot describe how it feels to be flayed, to have your flesh cut away in squares, peeled off of the muscle slowly and torturously. I will try, though.

Imagine if you can, the sensation of a paper cut. Now turn that small cut an inch deep and extend it about four inches down and two inches across, and instead of paper, substitute a knife. Now you have a square-shaped incision in your shoulder, just as I did. Then take a waxing strip and put it to your arm. Feel the hairs come off? It stings like hell. But instead of pulling off a little strip, imagine someone's fingers digging around in that incision, grabbing on to a thick layer of your epidermis, and trying to remove it just like that waxing strip. But the thing about your skin is that it's _attached_ to the muscle. It wasn't made to go any other place. So when you try to remove it, it's like uprooting a fully-grown plant or tearing the crust off a piece of bread, if that plant or bread had nerve endings, and if it was you.

I screamed. I couldn't help it. I couldn't stop. I screamed until my throat was sore, till it was bloody, till my lungs had no more oxygen. I was on fire, alive, a bundle of pain and terror, and it seemed like a hundred years had passed until he finished. I tried not to look at it, but like a car crash, I couldn't stop myself. I peeked out of the corner of my eye down at the raw red organs, tinged with blue and purple, and I tipped my head away as far as I could before the contents of my stomach came spilling out my mouth.

I could barely breathe, sobbing and moaning simultaneously, and I nearly passed out.

Shaw clicked his tongue at me. "No going to sleep now! You must stay awake and think about this, 407128. I will give you something that will help you." He retrieved the syringe, the one he was originally holding when I awoke. "This is a bit of adrenaline," he told me. "It will keep you alert, though it may also heighten your pain."

He stabbed me in the elbow with it and pumped the vile liquid into my veins, where it soon took hold of me. The pain and fear increased twofold, and I could hardly keep still. I struggled against my bonds, imagining what it would feel like when I grabbed that scalpel and drove it into Shaw's jugular. I was overwhelmed with the desire to rip his face off, break his bones, flay _him_.

But Shaw merely laughed at my fruitless struggles as he took off his little mouth mask and rubber gloves. "I shall be back soon, little Erik, never fear. In the meantime, I suggest you study how your shoulder feels at this exact moment. You'll need to remember it later on."

An eternity passed. Like a moment in Narnia, I aged into a man and became old and wrinkly after just a second. The pain never left me. Sometimes I didn't think about it that much, but it was never totally out of my mind, and neither was the death of my mother. Those two things were always close to the surface during that time, and I eventually realized that I was doing exactly what Shaw told me to – reflecting. Not just on my arm, though, on everything: my mom, my life before the war, my desire to destroy Shaw.

Whatever my life had been up until this time was gone. Over. There would be no mother, no little wooden house, no dress shop, no school. There was this room and there was Shaw, and all else remained uncertain. I didn't cry this time, though. At that point, I was beyond crying. I was furious. I could see one person responsible for this all, one person alone – Shaw.

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><p>Despite my cognitive inability to judge time there in that room, only three hours passed until Shaw returned, this time not alone.<p>

Adrenaline still circulating my system, my head snapped up as the door opened, and with a rise of fury, I did my best to launch the small rolling tables at him. However, all they did was skid a few feet and topple over, launching the plastic surgical tools pathetically to the ground.

"You're going to have to do better than that!" laughed Shaw as he entered the room, no longer dressed in doctor attire, holding something out for me to see. "This was retrieved from your things," he said as he laid the German coin that he had given me yesterday on my stomach. I glared down at the swastika, cold and disapproving against my bare Jewish skin. I did not want it.

Then I saw something I wish I hadn't, something that made me pray that I was hallucinating. Just then, a little girl edged in the room, followed by a soldier, one that was noticeably not wearing a helmet. No older than six, she was terribly skinny and dirty, her face smudged with tears and dust. Her blonde hair hung down limp and stringy and her dress was gray and torn, too short and too thin for the harsh fall weather. She looked at me suspiciously, frowning at the naked boy missing some skin.

"Are you okay?" she asked me in a tiny voice, and I realized that the expression she was wearing was not actually suspicion, but cautious worry. She was worried for me?

I was filled with a brand new type of pain, one that dulled that of my arm. I turned to Shaw. "No. Whatever it is, no. I refuse."

He folded his arms and looked down his pointy nose at me, saying, "Come now, Erik. You haven't even heard my proposition yet. But where are my manners? 351946, this is 407128. Erik, meet 351946."

"That's not her name. She has a name!" I yelled, dripping annoyance and anger. I took a deep breath and asked her calmly, "What is your name?"

"Else," she said shyly.

"Hi, Else. I'm Erik. Don't mind this guy – he's just some Nazi asshole." I looked at Shaw for his reaction, but there was none. Amusingly, I saw the soldier stiffen angrily instead. Apparently he set some faith in the Reich.

"Good, now that formalities are out of the way, shall we get to the point? Erik, I want you to take that quarter on your stomach and levitate it above you. If you refuse, I will remove more of your flesh. If you fail, I will remove some of hers."

Shaw looked at me levelly, but I couldn't help stare at him wide-eyed. "You're not serious," I said disbelievingly.

"I am quite serious," he said firmly. "And if you don't believe me, how does your shoulder feel?" He stood like a mountain; unmoving, imperious, authoritative. He would not budge.

I looked at the girl, who cocked her head at me questioningly. She had no idea what was going on. She didn't belong. She was innocent. I shifted my gaze down to the coin, to the eagle carrying the swastika, and I reminded myself of the thousands just outside this building in the concentration camps, of Hitler and his rabid speeches, of my homeland destroyed by the Nazi army, raking through our towns and fields, taking who and what they will. I allowed myself to become a vessel of rage, filling up and overflowing in no time at all. I stared at that little eagle as if it had Shaw's face on it, and, all the blood rushing to my face, I willed the coin to rise into the air.

Shaking and uncertain, it did.

I heard Else gasp and the soldier stand up straighter, and I could practically feel Shaw's grin. "Excellent, Erik! Truly excellent!" He actually clapped in excitement.

I let the coin drift back down, exhaling. That wasn't that tough, I thought. I could get the hang of this.

"Now, Erik, pick up the tables you knocked over," Shaw commanded.

I set my sights on the wheeling metal surgical trays and tried to conjure up the same hate I had for the eagle on the coin. I clenched my jaw and wiggled my fingers, holding my breath in concentration. They didn't move. I took another breath and tried again. Straining against my bonds, I arched my back and felt myself go red in the face, veins popping, and I thought of my mother. _It's okay, Erik._ Those were her last words. _It's okay. It's okay!_

The sound of a gunshot, her body crumpling to the floor, the sociopathic laugh of Shaw… Holding those images in my mind, the tables righted themselves quickly, and with a jerk of my hands and a grunt of exertion, I sent them flying in Shaw's direction.

He easily sidestepped one, but the other hit his head with a dull thud before it fell the ground, leaving a welt and a trail of blood running down his forehead. "You little shit!" he yelled furiously. I shrank away from him, realizing that I was still immobilized shortly before I realized that he wasn't heading for me at all. He grabbed the little girl's hair and dragged her to me, reaching into his coat and pulling out a gun. Poor Else whimpered and I cried out, but Shaw overrode us both, shouting, "So you think you've figured it all out? You think you don't need me, ungrateful brat? If you can kill me, then surely you can save her!" He cocked the gun and brought the barrel to her head.

"No!" I cried, struggling so hard against my bonds that I felt the skin break around my wrists and shins. "No!"

"Come on, Erik! Take this gun out of my hand! Go ahead! Do it!"

I thrashed about violently, trying to set my brain entirely onto that gun. I had to move it. I had to. I had to save Else, I had to stop him, I had to, I had to—

With an eardrum-shattering boom, the gun went off and I was showered in blood and brains. Shaw pushed little Else's broken body onto me, where it laid in a heap. I shook and twisted and fought against my bonds again, blood freely flowing where they bit into me, no longer in control, no longer mentally available. I did not notice Shaw and the soldier leaving until it was too late. Shaw had said that I was a wild animal before this all started. Now I was circling around the room on my flying table, spraying vomit and blood and guts all over as I went, the metal unfolding and shaping around me, screaming as if my very soul was being crushed. Shaw was wrong. _Now_ I was wild.

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><p><strong>Author's Note: Thanks, everyone, for the kind comments. They're really a great motivator.<strong>

**To answer Lil Kistune-chan: possibly. But right now Charles is in a future so distant, I'm uncomfortable saying plain yes or no. I mainly plan to explore Erik between the death of his mother up until the introduction of Charles, because, after all, we know what happens when he meets him. But who knows? Charles may appear somewhere along the line for kicks and giggles.**

**Fishyicon: Thank you for your reviews. You made me realize that I should probably warn my readers before I surprise them with graphic scenes like this.**

**Laurkenobi: Thanks for the correction, I wasn't aware of that! I think perhaps for coherency, however, I will continue to call him Shaw, although more for my sake than the reader's.**


	5. Clarity

**Clarity**

The following twenty-four hours were lost to me, as pain, hunger, and fatigue took turns battering my body. Suffice to say it was one of my more unpleasant experiences, being trapped in that bright room with a rotting corpse and no food, water, or facilities. I vaguely remember lying in a pool of metal, and thinking it rather curious that it melted when everything was so cold, but that is about it.

I don't recall anyone extricating me from that place, but when I woke up, the scenery had been changed entirely.

I was in a soft, warm bed, with only minimally scratchy sheets, and a natural yellow light was streaming through an open window. Had I not felt like I had been chewed up like gum and spat back out again, I probably would have thought that it all really had been just a figment of my over-imaginative mind. However, when thoughts of Mama or Else hit me, I knew that it wasn't. They were gone, and somehow it was all my fault.

I felt like a deflated balloon. I wasn't going to cry; I couldn't. I was numb, struck with the truth of that thought. It was all my fault. Sure, Shaw pulled the trigger, literally, but if I hadn't… Maybe if I just… I should have…

I turned my head away, closing my eyes. It didn't matter now. They were gone and I was here.

I laid like that for a long time, possibly hours, just barely breathing and thinking as little as possible, drowning in apathy. At one point I half-heartedly tried to move the little stand holding my IV, but it merely shuddered and I gave up. Eventually a nurse came in to check on me and redress my shoulder. I desperately avoided her gaze, but even then I could feel the waves of unfriendliness radiating off of her.

Looking back on it, I realize I was not in the prisoner's hospital. The room was a single and it was far too nice for them to waste it on an 'undesirable.' Perhaps this was Shaw expressing his remorse?

Either way, it was dark and I was wandering through uneasy dreams when another, considerably more hostile person walked into my room. "Erik," he said. Just one word, one voice that kicked me so far out of drowsiness that I found myself sitting up straight, fists clenched and teeth bared only a second after it was uttered.

"Shaw," I growled.

"Now, now, son. No need for that tone," he chastised wearily, sitting down in the single chair located across from the bed. He was not grinning now. He had no air of general superiority, or of arrogance or cruelty. In fact, he looked as tired as I felt just a few moments ago.

"I…" he took a deep breath and looked down into his folded hands. I cocked my head curiously. "I just wanted to tell you that I take no pleasure in what I did. Flaying people… killing children… it's certainly not something they put in the job description." He allowed himself a small smile.

"You have to understand, however, that all this is necessary. Maybe you don't see it now, and you may not tomorrow or next year, but one day you will. You'll realize that everything I do, all these lessons that we will have, they're all for your benefit, believe it or not. I can make you great, Erik. It will not be easy or pleasant… But I can do it if you're willing to learn."

He got up and was about to leave when he paused by the door. "And if you're not… Well I suppose you can follow your brothers and sisters in to the 'showers,' now can't you?" He smiled nastily, and I caught a glimpse of the Shaw I knew and hated. "It's your choice."

Then he was gone, and I was lying back in bed, much as I had been not minutes before. Now, however, the wheels in my mind were spinning faster and with more coherency than they had in a long time. My instincts were screaming, _No. Absolutely not. He cannot be trusted. Once you start down this road, you can't turn back._

But my mind, filled with a sudden clarity, replied, _I have already begun. Listen – I have no life down at the camp, you know that. I need to learn to harness my power, otherwise what good is it? If I let Shaw teach me… Then I'll eventually become strong enough to take him down. If I can get him to trust me, then the second he lets his guard down, I can destroy him._

In other words, I could stay in the camps and likely contract a disease or die of starvation and malnutrition, or I could be taken under the wing of the dragon… I thought back to my deathly bunk and hairy blanket, the gaunt faces of dead men and woman walking, the extermination of an entire body of people simply based off their religion. I thought of Mama, and myself. Shaw may have killed her, but he did not bring us here. He did not shave our heads and emaciate us; they did. The Nazis. Shaw was a dangerous psychopath, to be sure. But perhaps under his tutelage, I could gain the knowledge to take him down, and the Third Reich too, if I could. I had a sudden vision of collapsing Hitler's house with a flick of my wrist…

I folded my uninjured arm behind my head, smiling. Yes, that would be nice. Very nice, indeed.


	6. Blur

**Blur**

Thus began the steady, painstaking process of creating a mask, a callus so thick that it could block out any emotion or feeling that I might encounter during my run with Shaw. I was twelve going on forty-five, and I soon forgot what it was like to laugh, joke, or feel anything besides apathy and disgust. In this period, I truly became the machine I am today, though I was still very naïve. This transition took the rest of my childhood to play out, and I suppose I was not always as strong and powerful as I thought I was. In fact, I never quite realized in my daze of hate and revenge, just how under Shaw's thumb I truly was. That's probably my biggest regret, looking back on it – following Shaw's orders to gain his trust, something I should never have expected to get anyway.

Despite my inner battles and outward coolness, I never lost sight of my mission. I carried that damned coin with me at all times, imagining over and over how I would eventually dispose of Shaw. I settled upon taking that coin and sliding it through his skull as if it were made of butter, slowly and satisfyingly. A bullet was much too fast; this he would be able to feel fully, and then maybe he would appreciate my dedication to him more. When I was with him, as a child, I always felt like he took me for granted; a hobby, a pastime, a groupie, a bodyguard. No more. In his final hour, I would make him appreciate me.

But I couldn't kill him right away. I was too weak, too ignorant. I needed him to show me how to live. And, by god, he did just that. He lead me down that twisted road, and showed me just how dark the world can really be. I honestly haven't seen the light since.

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><p>"Come with me," Shaw said.<p>

He lead me out of the Nazi section of the camp, where the staff slept and ate while not on duty. It was the day after he made his grand proposition. I had gotten out of bed of my own accord, torn out the IV with some difficulty, and wandered around, ducking behind corners when I came across someone, until I found his office. He was sitting down at his desk writing something.

I slid into his room and made a small noise in my throat. Surprised, he looked at me above his reading glasses and broke into a smile. "I am very glad you have made the right choice, Erik."

And, just like that, I was in. He didn't make me swear an oath, or even say anything out loud. He simply knew that I was there because I wanted him to teach me. However, I had one reservation, one detail that needed to be cleared up before I fully immersed myself into his ugly world.

"Else," was what I said.

"What?" he asked uncomprehendingly.

"You know… the girl." The girl he killed. The girl he left with me. The girl who died because of me.

"Oh—that. Yes, what about her?" He took off his glasses and peered at me.

"Why was she there? Why did you bring her?" I asked him, feeling very small. It was that question that had kept me up last night, tugging at my conscious. If her life was on me, I had to know why.

"For motivation," he said simply. "Originally, we had your mother with you, right? I brought Whatshername – Else was it? – in to ensure you would give yourself one-hundred percent to the situation at hand. In my experience, some people are willing to endure pain to avoid something, but when they're responsible for someone else's life, they become much more willing to do what I want. I raised the stakes," he said with a shrug.

If someone's appearance reflected what they had on the inside, Shaw would have had talons, tentacles, and fangs. I fought the urge to try and kill him again, and instead stood very still.

"Okay," I said eventually, turning his words over in my head. I supposed that was a plausible excuse, if you were a heartless bastard like Shaw. "Here's the deal: I'll let you teach me, I'll do whatever you say, as long as you never put me in a situation like that again."

Shaw looked at me with an unreadable expression, almost as if he was sizing me up. "Alright," he said. "Shall we begin lesson two, then?"

I nodded and he took me out of his office, offering me some clean clothes—I was still wearing the hospital shift. After ducking into a bathroom to change, I examined myself in the mirror. I was pale and solemn-looking, dark circles under my eyes, and terribly skinny. And I was wearing a Hitler Youth uniform.

Fighting the urge to be sick, I let Shaw take me outside to the fence separating the German quarters from the Jewish quarters. Here the fence was high and thick, so great their desire to keep the two spheres separate. He brought me to a spot where the wood had crumbled away, leaving just a chain-link fence, through which the concentration camp in all its filth and horror was visible.

There were people everywhere, some milling about aimlessly, some lounging, some laboriously splitting rocks, and others amusing themselves with card games. They all had the same expression, though; defeat. This was their purgatory, their time in between life and salvation. They couldn't wait to die.

"Look how pathetic and resigned they are," Shaw said, laying a hand on my shoulder. I looked up at him with ill-disguised anger, and he laughed. "I don't hate them because they're Jewish, Erik! I could care less about religion—they're all the same to me anyway."

That was unexpected. "Why then?" I asked him, sounding innocent even to my own ears.

"Despite what Mein Fuhrer thinks," he said, brushing his swastika armband, "it makes no difference what race or religion it is. It's all in the _species._"

I had no idea what he was talking about, so he simplified it some. "I hate them because they're human, Erik. They are so weak, so emotional, so inferior. They're consumed with fear, so much so they lock each other up into little death camps, where they systematically eliminate each other. For what? To build a 'master race?'" He laughed out loud. "Hitler has it all wrong – forget about blonde hair and blue eyes, the master race is _you_, Erik. It's me. It's everyone with special abilities. These people, these rats, can't even imagine the things we can do. And if they could, it's likely that we'd be the ones in there, not out here.

"Without full use of our powers, though, we are just like them. If you hide forever in the shadows, my boy, and pretend that you are no different, then you truly _are no different_. Only when you realize your potential can you be great. It's not easy though, and there is always room for improvement, but never _ever _be ashamed of it, Erik. Your power is what makes you special – it's what makes you better than them. But first, you have to be able to use it."

I absorbed this drop of philosophy like a sponge, finding myself nodding in agreement. Shaw appealed to my logic, if not my quickly disappearing sense of right and wrong. As if to punctuate this speech, I stared at the chain link fence and willed one of the diamonds to become a perfectly round circle. Shaw smiled down at me and I felt a sudden elation at having pleased him, followed by a sinking of my stomach, realizing that I just took pleasure in his praise. I held my mother tighter in my mind – I would not become a victim of Stockholm's Syndrome.

"It's a start, Erik. It's a start. I think that's all for now, however. I must attend to some business, but please, feel free to make yourself at home in my office. I will set you up with a room on this side of the fence, and in no time, we will resume your lessons. Until then." He clapped me on the shoulder and walked away, leaving me to ponder his words and this picture of misery before me.

They _were_ rather pathetic, I thought, hating myself for it. Why did they not fight back? There were plenty more of them than German soldiers, and yet they didn't dare try to stand up and fight. I thought back to my own journey here and the terror that had consumed me as we were forcibly relocated, only eased by the fact I still had Mama with me. Resistance hadn't even been a ghost of a thought in my head; I was still a baby then, even if that was only four days ago. But if they united, there in that camp—Jew, gay, gypsy, Pole, Jehovah's Witness—then they would be a force unstoppable, even if they weren't armed. And should the Germans put them down by force, surely that was better than quietly dying in a gas chamber or slowly starving to death?

I switched my gaze from the prisoners to the officers. Two stood more or less facing me, guarding the entrance to what was probably a storage area. They were straight as an arrow, tall, fit, and reasonably good looking. They were everything that German men were supposed to be. However, their true identities lay not in their appearances, but behind their eyes.

One man watched the prisoners before him, following their movements with the shifting of his pupils, his face of complete complacency. He was so sure of his superiority and his moral rightness that you could practically smell the smugness radiating off him. Sure, these were brutal living conditions, but, hey, it was all right, because these people didn't deserve to live anyway. He was making the world a better place, after all. Stupid son of a bitch, I thought contemptuously.

The other officer stood staring off into space. There was no light on in his head, I could tell; just empty space between his overlarge ears. He was probably wondering what his wife was making for dinner, up there in the Nazi quarters, or whether if tomorrow the rain would continue. Either way, based on his slack-jawed expression and glassy eyes, he was obviously thinking something brain-numbingly mundane.

Were these men realizing their full potential? Did they even _have_ potential? I wasn't so sure. The lines were beginning to blur in my eyes, and everything I used to be certain of was slowly slipping away, making room for new thoughts and opinions of the world around me, all shaped by Shaw. It made me uneasy, but at the same time, what he said made sense, much more than any of Mama's explanations for my ability had. He was an evil psycho killer, but maybe, just maybe, he got a few things right.


	7. A Start

**A Start**

The next few months passed by in a blur of endless lessons and constant, but mild, unpleasantness, and I became something of Shaw's lap dog as we traveled to and fro various Nazi headquarters and death camps. I was never far out of his sight, however, and had no extra time to practice the more homicidal aspects of my talent onto anyone of import.

However, this period in my life was not what you would call boring or uneventful. Sure, there were stretches of days and weeks where nothing memorable happened, but they were always punctuated and spiced by a few high-excitement, usually uncomfortable situations, most dealing with certain lessons that Shaw put me up to, including more trips to white rooms filled with knives and pain-inducing instruments. True to his word, Herr Doctor did not bring in any more 'motivation,' but he did not relinquish the desire to poke me with needles and bind me in restraints for long periods of time. I lost quite a bit of innocence, unsurprisingly, under his tutelage. I suppose that was the point—to become a warrior, not to stay a child. Regardless, I learned a great and many little tips that I filed away for later use.

For example, I came to realize that when arranging to meet a possible foe, one must always do it in a public place with many witnesses to decrease the likelihood of the situation coming to blows. Of course, that didn't always work, but the bystanders were only human, after all. In addition to this, I learned that in such public places, one should position oneself in a corner, or with at least one natural barrier guarding your backside, to avoid getting snuck up on. And, above all else, one must always make sure where the exits are, should they need to be utilized.

Aside from fairly common-knowledge strategies like that, Shaw overviewed the teaching of common, practical, formal, and traditional methods of fighting. I learned how to street brawl, which was fairly straightforward and easy, you simply had to gather all your fury and batter the daylights out of your opponent with any weapon that was at hand. He taught me how to sword-fight, which I thought was antiquated and rather useless, but Shaw insisted.

"This is how we've been fighting for centuries!" he'd always remind me. "Just because we can kill one another now with the push of a button, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't forget the ways of our ancestors!"

I found swords weighty, however, and difficult to wield. Nevertheless, I eventually got the footwork down, and my arms and back became stronger, so that I was whirling and twirling exceptionally well as I sparred a random soldier who was handy with the blade in the courtyard at some camp in Germany. I didn't realize Shaw had been watching until I heard his clapping from behind me.

"Well done, my boy!" he cried delightedly. "You certainly are coming along!"

I didn't stop or turn around or drop my guard, should the officer get any funny ideas, so I just kept on and grunted by way of response. Shaw circled, assessing our abilities and moves.

"Ah, see, you had an opening right there," he said to me, stroking his chin lightly. He was correct—I had had an opening. As the soldier shifted his weight from his right to his left, he had dropped his arm just a hair, so that I momentarily had a straight shot to his heart. Of course I didn't take it though—this was just practice after all, I didn't actually want to kill the man, Nazi or not.

"Next time you see one, take it," Shaw said with finality. "Do not hesitate; your enemies will not either."

I tore my eyes away from my fight to look at Shaw questioningly. He had his flat, unreadable face on, and returned my gaze with hard eyes. They did not accept questions or misgivings. They gave orders that were to be followed, or else. And, just like that, I was in a fight to the death.

Something in the air shifted, filling with the tension and adrenaline of a high-stake competition, and my eyes locked with the man I fought. He had heard Shaw too, and he looked at me with calculating respect. Skill-wise, I was a worthy opponent, despite my obvious youth, and, being Shaw's protégée, I posed as a real threat. Meanwhile, he, a full-grown man with strength and experience on his side, would be difficult to take down.

Sweat poured down my face as we dueled, but I didn't dare slow down or let my arms rest for just a minute. I didn't notice a small crowd start to gather—no one existed except him and me. Once, early on, the soldier feinted a blow to my left and instead dove into my right. I recovered just in time to parry it, but it still glanced of my side, scraping past my ribs with a fiery bite. I stepped up my game there and then, and came very close to slashing open his chest seconds later.

In the haze of it I lost track of time—it could have been hours or only a matter of minutes before I spotted my next opening. The battle had progressed from a display of showmanship to a sort of haphazard brawl, since my initial wound, which I no longer felt, so great was my focus. When you're fighting for your life like that, time tends to slow down, and there is no future and no past, just you and the sword. It didn't even occur to me that I could probably melt both our weapons with a thought. I was too wrapped up in my activity, which I zoned into completely, forgetting myself.

I didn't hesitate when I stabbed that man. Looking back on it, I suppose I should have. He was my first real kill, the first life I took with my own hands, and yet… I felt nothing. There was no inner debate in my mind seconds before it happened. I didn't flinch or pause or even think about it. I saw the opening and I took it. I suppose that says something about my character.

With a grunt, I thrust my entire body weight through the tip of my sword, propelling it through his chest, puncturing his body cavity with surprising difficulty. We met eyes once more, his brown ones wide with surprise. He seemed to be in shock, rather than unbearable pain. Still standing, he staggered towards me, reaching out for my shoulders for support, but he fell, and there on the ground, he exhaled his last breath.

I wiped my sweaty hands on my pants and stared at him. He was so… inanimate and non-threatening. It seemed in comprehensible to me that he had been trying to kill me just a second ago—he was just a heap now. Not a person; a pile of limbs, a piece of mass with no purpose or function. As an afterthought, I wrenched my sword free of his chest, and was soon enveloped by a laughing, approving, congratulatory Shaw. Apparently I had done well.

After mastering sword fighting, Shaw taught me more modern methods of destruction, demonstrating how to shoot a gun, and telling me the basics about missiles and bombs. This was also fairly straightforward, requiring little to no finesse. I found myself unintentionally guiding my bullets, as I target-practiced with Shaw, so that they always found the bulls-eye. He found this generally amusing, but what he didn't know was that I was imagining his face on every single target.

Finally, after all of this, was I allowed to perfect my own ability. At this point, I decided that all my previous lessons in fighting had been a waste of time, as I could easily and efficiently stab someone without lifting a finger. Why would I hit someone in the face and smash a bottle over their head, when I could just kill or stun them with their own belt buckle? It seemed all very silly to me, shooting guns and sword fighting, but Shaw had his reasons. I privately felt that it was to make me realize what normal people have to deal with, what he himself had to deal with. The thought of my being above him made me smirk with pleasure, because really I knew that I was the powerless one in our relationship.

He took amusement in leading me in one direction or another, whether physically or mentally, I came to realize during that time. He liked to operate under the veil that this was for my own good, that he was the benevolent mentor in our situation; but really I knew it just helped him pass the time. In fact, I think he was rather bored with the whole Nazi world-domination scene. Definitely on one of the more fringe factions of the party, his beliefs and theoretical military tactics dealt entirely with 'supernatural' beings or objects, including but not limited to utilizing mutants such as myself, obtaining the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail, somehow creating undead mercenaries to fight entire battles, and constructing a bomb so large and so powerful that it could wipe out a whole country within a matter of seconds. However, he set the most stock in the idea that if the Reich could form a cohesive army of freaks like me, they would be unstoppable. Privately, I agreed, though I couldn't imagine that there were many of us out there. However, most of the Nazis tended to be more conservative and wary of the more out-there methods of conquering Europe, and Shaw's plans fell on silent ears. But as the war became increasingly futile in year '45, Shaw's campaign proved fruitful, as the Fuhrer personally assigned him the task of creating a 'specialized' army.

Overwrought with excitement, Shaw shortly after pulled me into his office to uncap one of his long-winded high-energy speeches that he usually reserved for powerful politicians.

"You know what this means, little Erik?" he practically exploded, foaming at the mouth. It took a great amount of will not to step back in horror. Not waiting for my flat, one-word response (as were most of my remarks nine times out of ten), he kept on going.

"This means that I have the resources—no, the _money_—to track down more people like you and me! I've been waiting for an opportunity like this for a very, very long time. Now I finally have the wealth and the position to create an army, to gather lonely and confused mutants up and to mold them into machines to do my bidding, my own!"

In his excitement, he must have forgotten that I was in fact a person with ears and a brain, and that I could easily put two and two together and realize that he was 'teaching' me for purely selfish reasons. But, then again, I already knew that, and I was really only staying with him for purely selfish reasons—revenge. So I kept my face a clean slate, emotionless and thoughtless, pretending that I didn't actually hear him.

"—of course I'll need to find a seer or a telepath to find them all, and that in itself will be difficult—" he said, muttering to himself rather than me. "—but then when that's done, it will be probably easy for them to come with me – oh I can't wait! You can't imagine the things some can do, little Erik. What you do is remarkable, simply remarkable, but there are some that are positively unbelievable!"

He blabbered on like this for quite some time, pulling out a bottle of liquor to celebrate. He thoughtlessly handed me a glass, and I drank it, the amber liquid burning my throat all the way down.

That was how it started. With a blank check, Herr Doctor and I flew off in an airplane – an actual airplane; my young self was mesmerized – to Delphi to consort some kind of oracle. I was not permitted to come with him, and instead waited at the airfield, curiously inspecting the immense vehicles.

There was a humming in them that I hadn't noticed before, each particle of metal alive to my mind like a million small creatures. I held my hand inches from one plane, arm raised past my head to reach it, and it bristled to my touch, like hairs on an arm. I touched its body, cool and hard, and almost felt a heartbeat, imagined or otherwise. I concentrated, closing my eyes and holding my breath, imagining the metal around my hand fitting to its shape. Nothing happened; I was still not ready, not strong enough to dent something, let alone take down Shaw.

I sighed and sat down and waited for a long time, earning strange and almost frightful glances from pilots and mechanics, who looked at me and my uniform and saw a lost child-soldier. They were Nazis themselves, of course, in this German air base, and were not at all taken aback by the swastika pin on my lapel, but instead were wary of my apparent status as Shaw's assistant. They thought he was dangerous, and naturally, by association, so was I.

Shaw came bouncing back after many long hours, waving a wad of paper in my face ecstatically. "I was given names and locations of dozens – dozens! – of other mutants! I called into headquarters and we can start gathering them immediately! Well? What are you waiting for? Let's go!" We had climbed into the plane, and Herr Doctor was now yelling at the pilot to start the plane and be out of here.

"Where to?" the pilot asked.

Shaw unfolded his paper and looked down, a grin spreading on his face. "Liverpool, England."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Whoa, guys, sorry for the long hiatus. My muse is often intense and fleeting… But I saw the movie again today, and it seems to have revived me some. Did anyone else orgasm when it first cut to Michael Fassbender? Anyone? Maybe it's just me, but that man is SEXY. **

**Anyways, I do have something of a plot mapped out in my mind… You should stick around to see what it is. And you know what keeps me going? An inbox full of reviews *****hint hint*****. Stay classy, people of FanFiction.**

**PS: I have changed the name of my story. Apart from being the incorrect numbers, this story is much more than just Erik's life in the camps. So, from now, it's just The Life of E.L.**


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